TV anchors' salaries weigh heavy on American channels

Saturday 13 March 2010 19.08 EST
First published on Saturday 13 March 2010 19.08 EST

A cross-pond reality check. Writing in The Nation, Professor Eric Alterman looks at the misty world of TV news presenters' salaries and chokes. Katie Couric joined CBS from NBC for $15m a year plus $10m in marketing money, he reckons. Diane Sawyer at ABC was on $12m a year in 2006, before she got her promotion to front the evening news. When Peter Jennings, the ABC anchorman died four years ago, he left $54m – yet ABC is laying off 300 or more news reporters in a flood of crocodile tears.

"Imagine a world where evening anchors and morning hosts were paid like journalists instead of hedge-fund managers", says Alterman. And yes, in comparative terms, for all the current fury, I imagine you'd call it BBC world.